Challenge to state EM law to proceed

A judge is allowing a challenge to Michigan’s emergency manager law to go forward in federal court in Detroit.

Filed last year, the lawsuit challenges the constitutionality of the law on the grounds that it violates rights of due process, voting and representative government under the U.S. Constitution. Defendants in the case are Gov. Rick Snyder and former state Treasurer Andy Dillon.

Now, the judge has denied the state’s request and is allowing the case to go forward on the grounds that it violates the constitution’s equal protection clause. Currently a majority of Michigan’s African-American population lives in cities that have or have had emergency managers.

In his ruling Steeh wrote that his decision should not affect Detroit’s bankruptcy case, which was brought by the city’s emergency manager acting under the power of the law being challenged.

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